What the Smart Crowd is Thinking

Every August, veteran Wall Street strategist Byron Wien hosts a series of lunches for leading financial professionals. Here's what's on their minds.

Every August for the past several decades I have organized a series of Friday lunches for serious financial professionals who spend their summer weekends in eastern Long Island. What started as a single lunch for half a dozen people has grown to four lunches at different locations for more than eighty.

Participants include many well-known names, of whom some are billionaires, but others, though widely respected for their intellect and insights, have a net worth that may be more modest. They are a reasonably diverse group...